DirtFish Women in Motorsport driver Aoife Raftery is targeting a permanent switch to four-wheel-drive next year
Photography by Trevor Lyden
Words by Luke Barry
What’s next?
A phrase now commonly associated with Formula 1 driver Valtteri Bottas, but equally applicable to DirtFish Women in Motorsport Driver Aoife Raftery.
The Irishwoman starred by claiming her first ever outright podium at last weekend’s Overmountain Rally Tennessee, driving a Ford Fiesta Rally3 in competition for the first time. But her Junior European Rally Championship season is over, and the calendar isn’t full for the rest of 2025 or indeed 2026.
Bottas has his answer – he’s off to Cadillac to race in Formula 1. What about Aoife?
“Ideally, I’d like to be moving to four-wheel-drive now,” Raftery told DirtFish. “I think we’ve had a good run in the front-wheel-drive Rally4 class, but ultimately we need to start progressing and hopefully move to four-wheel-drive from now on.”
The evidence from her 2025 American Rally Association performances suggests she’s ready for it – whether that’s competing Stateside, in Europe, or even both.
Raftery's target is to be driving four-wheel-drive cars all the time in 2026
“It’d be great to be rallying more in the US,” Raftery added, “The sport is growing over there quite a lot. They’re great rallies with really diverse stages and there is good competition there. At the weekend we were always looking to compare our times with Travis Pastrana and Sean Donnelly in our class, but also looking at Conner Martell in his Rally2. It’s really great to see what the pace is like over there.
“Of course, my ultimate goal would be to get to the rally in the WRC, but we are now working on plans for 2026 so continuing in four-wheel-drive and making that step up is important. There’s a big budget we have to work on and gather to get plans in place but we are working on it, and I do hope that we will be rallying back in the US.
“Right now what I can say is we don’t have a confirmed plan for next year, but we are working on it for the rest of this year. We put a really big push in to get Overmountain over the line with the idea to use that to push for next season. But the rally went quite well, so it’d be great to see if we’re able to do something else before the end of the year.”
The one thing Raftery knows she’s definitely doing is supporting fellow DirtFish Women in Motorsport Driver Michele Abbate when she makes her first rally start at next weekend’s Tour de Forest (Saturday October 4).
“I’m really looking forward to that,” she said. “I think the biggest thing for Michele is probably going to be getting used to someone telling her where to go and listening to the pacenotes.
“She’s plenty of experience racing herself and driving and that will definitely come in very useful in the rally and for car control. But I think pacenotes are something all drivers are always still working on and improving for every rally, so it’ll be the same for her. I’m excited to see how she gets on.”
Raftery and Abbate are both pushing for the same goal: to boost the number of women participating in motorsport.
For Raftery’s own career, to stand on the podium was obviously “really special” and “exciting”, but even more importantly it was further evidence that gender is no obstacle to success in rallying.
Alongside her own co-driver Hannah McKillop and Rhianon Gelsomino who co-drive Travis Pastrana to second place in Tennessee, half of the people on the ARA National podium were women.
Half of the competitors standing on the overall podium in Tennessee were women
“It meant a lot,” Raftery explained, “for me and the DirtFish team. With the DirtFish Women in Motorsport Program we’re not just there to compete, but we’re there to actually put ourselves against the guys and prove that everyone is equal.
“Josie [Rimmer] launched this program this year, and to see it taking off in this way is really exciting to see, and it will only keep building from here. I think to get on the podium, first time in the Rally3 and with the Standard Motorsport team, shows what we’re able to do, and it’s so important.
“You see all the young girls coming up to you at parc exposé and in the service park – which is quite a special thing about American rallying that you can actually get to come up and meet the drivers – and hopefully this will help them realize what they’re able to do as well.”
Words:Luke Barry
Tags: Aoife Raftery, ARA, ARA 2025, DirtFish Women in Motorsport, ERC
Publish Date September 26, 2025 DirtFish 
https://dirtfish-editorial.s3-accelerate.amazonaws.com/2025/09/8JRKXOIl-TrevorLyden-Overmountain2025-6874-1-780x520.jpg September 26, 2025
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